The MAPS Forum is an electronic discussion group that supports MAPS’ mission by allowing members to interact with each other and with international experts in the psychedelic field. Topics may include current news, book reviews, factual questions about psychedelics or marijuana, psychedelics and marijuana in the media, ideas for research and fundraising, and articles in the quarterly MAPS Bulletin. The Forum is archived to serve as a permanent resource.

To subscribe or unsubscribe, visit the maps_forum information page.
To search the archives, use this search form.

To maintain the high standards that members expect from MAPS, this is a moderated list. Subscribers to maps_forum are assured of a high signal/noise ratio. An average of twelve messages/week are selected for posting to the list each day by the moderator. Although questions are welcome at all levels of interest, the moderator prefers posted comments to be presented at a level appropriate for a classroom or a professional meeting. Please review the guidelines for authors before posting.

Please be aware that all postings are archived. If you do not wish to have your real name associated with your posting, we suggest you use a pseudonym.

1. Topics may include current news, book reviews, factual questions about psychedelics or marijuana, psychedelics and marijuana in the media, ideas for research and fundraising, and articles in the MAPS quarterly bulletin. Students who have written class papers on psychedelic topics are encouraged to share their work here. Questions about anything MAPS is doing, or suggestions for anything MAPS should be doing, are encouraged. General drug policy discussions (prohibition vs. legalization) are not encouraged unless they specifically relate to research. Examples of acceptable drug policy topics include: the influence of drug policy on research, or the policy implications of research.

2. For purposes of legal safety, messages containing confessions of personal illegal drug use will not be posted to the group. Generally, reports on collections of personal experiences from a large subject number are preferred over n=1 studies. A list of other groups that encourage discussion of general drug policy, trip reports, or how to get high, is available by request.

3. (A) Please send list submissions to maps_forum@maps.org, not to the moderator’s personal address or to owner-maps_forum@maps.org-- this creates technical problems with the formatting of your message. (B) Please submit your posts in ASCII (basic keyboard) text only. No HTML or funny characters. (C) Please do not ask the moderator to research, revise, or spell-check your message for you. Understand the moderator’s job consists entirely in accepting/rejecting posts and making suggestions for revision.

4. Posted comments should be presented at a level appropriate for a classroom or a professional meeting. This means: (A) Assume a skeptical audience. Provide argumentation and evidence, rather than simply asserting your beliefs. Clearly state the central point you are trying to make early in your message. Provide definitions and/or examples when using unusual terminology or advanced concepts. Make references to the literature and/or URL’s whenever possible. (B) By the same token, please provide an introduction, summary, or discussion of all references or URL’s posted to the list. Don’t just post web addresses and say, "check this out." (C) Although original content is prefered, relevant cross-posts from other sources are welcome (especially when an introduction explaining the relevance is included).

5. An average of 12 messages/week will be selected for posting to the list. Short posts are prefered over longer posts. Consider breaking up longer works into a series of installments over a week or several weeks. If you have already received five messages from the forum in the past 24 hours, please wait until the next day to post. Persons who have not submitted recently will be given priority over those who post to the list often. In general, it is prefered that individual subscribers post no more often than once per week and only once or twice per thread (although there are numerous exceptions). Consider whether your response to a post is better sent to the author rather than to the entire list.

6. When responding to a post on the list, *briefly* quote only the relevant part of what you are specifically responding to, and write your message under the quote.

7. Occasionally, in the interest of free expression, off-topic posts will be allowed and will be identified with "off-topic" in the subject heading. This specifically means "do not reply to this post on-list."

Additional Guidelines:

A. Although questions are welcome at all levels of interest, please-- when posting questions to the group-- include some background information about your question. Why do you find the topic interesting? What other sources have you searched (Medline, PsychLit, google.com and what have you already learned? There are 1,200 subscribers to maps_forum, so if you’re going to ask all of us, make your question interesting to read.

B. Related to A: News-- informative posts that resolve uncertainty-- is preferred over discussion-- posts that are primarily speculative, with lots of uncertainties open to question. Tell us something we don’t already know.

C. Please, PLEASE read #1 and #2 above. MAPS-Forum is about scientific and clinical aspects of psychedelic and marijuana research-- with occasional digressions into trippy scientific topics in neuroscience and cosmology. There are plenty of other resources on the internet to talk about how to get high, your personal drug trips, and our mutual annoyance with drug laws that insult our natural freedom and intelligence. If you must provoke a discussion of the optimal method of self-administering some illegal substance, think of a clever way to do it so that I don’t notice that’s what you’re doing. (Hint: speaking in the third person is a good place to start.)

MAPS-Forum Editor